alusion (because the world needed it)

A Life to Remember (4)

and i oop-
category: series
word count: 1500

From when children are young, all parents tell them to stay away from the Abyss.  They spin tale software horrifying demons who will scare them and forever haunt their nightmares, witches that'll change them into frogs or make them into soup.  Small, innocent tales for small, innocent children.  In reality, the Abyss was, of course, frighteningly worse.  Demons would only forever haunt your nightmares if you managed to survive.  Witches wouldn't change them into frogs, no, they'd change you into slaves.  Witches wouldn't turn you to soup, they'd just throw you alive to whatever demon there was to suck up your soul or eat you alive.  The Abyss was not a place for humans, elves, or any good-meaning being, let alone children.  Such was common sense.  Logic.  Something that Gusion became ignorant to as he began his trek.

Before he had begun it, though, he had taken time to research.  The majority of the libraries he looked didn't hold the information he sought, the spells, the rituals, the magics he looked for cast down upon by society, labelled evil and dangerous.  Not that Gusion cared.  He was set in his decision, set looking for the needed spell.  Days blurred into each other, time meaning no concept towards the mage as his fingers travelled over countless spines of books, gaze skimming over hundreds of thousands of words.  He had never been a reader, but such was how it would be.  He would do anything to have his Alucard back.  Life was meaningless without him.

What Gusion could only assume to have been a month or two having been passed, that's when he found it.  Found her, more specifically.  The tale of the Demon Queen, now known as Vexana.  Tricked into jealously that ruined her entire kingdom, turned into a Necromancer.

Exactly what he needed.

He knew the book wasn't sprouting lies, he'd seen her works: Leomord, specifically.  Utterly life like.  Utterly real.  As if he hadn't even been dead.  If anything, Gusion would've been the one dead if he hadn't escaped in time.

So, from that point on, he changed his searching, focusing in on Vexana.  Such was much more fruitful, the search barely taking any time before he found the information he needed.

Thus became his journey.  His stupid, idiotic, desperate journey to a long-forgotten kingdom erased by the never-ending river of history.

Days were always blurred together.  If you were to ask, Gusion wouldn't be able to tell you how long it took for him to find the thousands of years old ruins.  Countless times he'd been attacked and ambushed, and he fought back more ferociously with each one, becoming more determined each time.  These were the beings that had killed his Alucard.  These were the beings that he didn't kill in time.  He wasn't going to make any mistake again.  Never again.

Finally, after countless attacks and timeless time passing by, he found the ruins.  It was all reclaimed by nature, dark, thick vines growing over former houses, some having thorns growing on them.  Venemous plants grew in clusters, some of them practically oozing with the poison they held.

The castle, though, was a vibrant contrast.  Its old walls barely held any of those vines and seemed to be decently kept, obviously so as the place hadn't been reduced to rubble.  Gusion walked up the winding staircase leading to the castle walls and, furthermore, doors, his mind not once straying to what this kingdom might've been if it still prospered.  His only thoughts were of completing his task, of bringing his Alucard back.  Nothing else mattered.

As he reached the old, rotten doors, he paused.  Was he supposed to knock?  Or would he be allowed to walk right in?  Hell, would the doors break if he walked inside?  Was there any escorts to guide you in, like some close kingdoms to the Moniyan Empire had?  Speaking of people, throughout the time Gusion has been nearing and entering the ruins, he had oddly enough felt as thought someone had been watching him.  He'd written it off to the multiple and many demons, but-